The Antimicrobial Peptide MPX Can Kill Staphylococcus aureus, Reduce Biofilm Formation, and Effectively Treat Bacterial Skin Infections in Mice

Abstract

Staphylococcus aureus is a common pathogen that can cause pneumonia and a variety of skin diseases. Skin injuries have a high risk of colonization by S. aureus, which increases morbidity and mortality. Due to the emergence of multidrug-resistant strains, antimicrobial peptides are considered to be among the best alternatives to antibiotics due to their unique mechanism of action and other characteristics. MPX is an antibacterial peptide extracted from wasp venom that has antibacterial activity against a variety of bacteria. This study revealed that MPX has good bactericidal activity against S. aureus and that its minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) is 0.08 μM. MPX (4×MIC) can kill 99.9% of bacteria within 1 h, and MPX has good stability. The research on the bactericidal mechanism found that MPX could destroy the membrane integrity, increase the membrane permeability, change the membrane electromotive force, and cause cellular content leakage, resulting in bactericidal activity. Results from a mouse scratch model experiment results show that MPX can inhibit colonization by S. aureus, which reduces the wound size, decreases inflammation, and promotes wound healing. This study reports the activity of MPX against S. aureus and its mechanism and reveals the ability of MPX to treat S. aureus infection in mice, laying the foundation for the development of new drugs for bacterial infections.

Larval Therapy and Larval Excretions/Secretions: A Potential Treatment for Biofilm in Chronic Wounds? A Systematic Review

“…Effective antibiofilm treatment strategies are desperately needed [ 54 ], and there are a plethora of novel strategies and compounds in development to address this pressing issue [ 158 , 159 , 160 ]. Many workers seek to co-opt, enhance, and reinvigorate existing wound-care treatments [ 59 , 161 ], whilst others look to innovate new treatments, such as antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) [ 162 , 163 ], topical antiseptics [ 164 ], nanotechnologies [ 165 , 166 ], or photodynamic therapy [ 167 , 168 ], to target chronic-wound biofilm. Larval therapy is an established and efficacious chronic-wound debridement therapy, achieved through the extracorporeal digestion of devitalized tissue by L. sericata ES.…”

Vancomycin Resistance in Enterococcus and Staphylococcus aureus

“…Against S. aureus , Yagi et al showed that adipose-derived human MSC conditioned media significantly inhibited S. aureus growth in vitro even without continued adipose-derived human MSC presence, and antimicrobial peptide production, namely LL-37, could be enhanced with the addition of vitamin D. In vivo , Johnson, Webb and Dow demonstrated that MSC therapy also induced antimicrobial peptide production and enhanced antibiotic treatment against a chronic S. aureus biofilm infection in mice [ 512 , 513 , 514 ]. Non-human antimicrobial peptides, such as MPX from wasp venom have also demonstrated efficacy against S. aureus in vitro and in a mouse wound infection model [ 515 ]. The currently known antimicrobial peptides that have exclusively shown antibacterial activity against VISA and VRSA, and their possible mechanisms of action have been reviewed by Hernández-Aristizábal and Ocampo-Ibáñez [ 516 ].…”

Antimicrobial Peptide MPX with Broad-Spectrum Bactericidal Activity Promotes Proper Abscess Formation and Relieves Skin Inflammation

“…To this end, the effects of the antimicrobial peptide MPX on the gram-positive bacterium S. aureus ATCC 25923, the gramnegative bacteria E. coli ATCC 25922 and Salmonella CVCC 541, and the fungus Candida albicans ATCC 90029 were investigated in this experiment. In addition, previous studies in our laboratory showed that the antimicrobial peptide MPX has a good relieving effect on skin in ammation caused by S. aureus [12]. However, the effect on acute in ammatory injury caused by S. aureus is still unknown.…”

“…Preliminary studies in our laboratory have shown that MPX has good bactericidal potential [11,12]. However, the broad-spectrum antimicrobial properties of MPX are still unknown.…”